The mPOWER(TM) Strikes Back!

Update Follows Recent Victory Over Competition

Houston ISD Chooses mPOWER for Multimedia Institute

NOVATO, Calif., June 21 /PRNewswire/ -- The Learning Company, a division of Mattel, Inc (NYSE: MAT), today announced the release of mPOWER 3.0, an important update to the already popular multimedia presentation tool. The release coincides with several notable successes in the field, as mPOWER seeks to become the dominant multimedia presentation tool in the market.

Brian Snediker, president and co-founder of Multimedia Design Corporation, enthused, "I am thrilled with this new version of mPOWER, and the ongoing development efforts by MDC and The Learning Company. Users of mPOWER should look for tremendous feature enhancements in mPOWER 3.0, and versions to come!"

New Features on Hybrid CD-ROM

The latest release of mPOWER 3.0 includes Macintosh and Window versions on the same CD-ROM. Both versions now offer sound-editing, with fade in and out; as well as an image editor that can crop, scale and rotate graphics. Even more file formats are now supported, including animated GIF, AVI, MPEG, MIDI, AIFF, and WAV, in addition to QuickTime 3.0 and QuickTime VR.

Also new is a button that launches Kid Pix Studio Deluxe(R) from within the program, so the user can create drawings for a presentation, and then return right to mPOWER. This feature makes it even easier for students who are already using Kid Pix for their multimedia classroom projects to move up to the advanced capabilities of mPOWER 3.0.

New to the Windows version will be a video editor to cut, copy and paste clips; and a "chalk" feature that permits on-screen highlighting during playback of presentations.

mPOWER Chosen Best of Show at TCEA

At this spring's TCEA conference in Austin, TX, mPOWER was honored with the TCEA Media Center's "Technish" award for Best Multimedia Program. Going head-to-head with several multimedia presentation tools, mPOWER beat out Hyperstudio for top spot. In an email sent by the Media Center to all of the entrants, Art and Joan Myrick consoled the also-rans, "If we did not select your product for a category ... well, it's back to the drawing board. Someone one-upped you."

Houston ISD Adopts mPOWER for Teacher Training

For the third year in a row, the Houston Independent School District will use mPOWER to train teachers in its Multimedia Advanced Technology Training Institute. Graduates of the Institute will then serve as mentors at their own and neighboring schools. During each of six week-long sessions, participants will first become totally immersed in using peripherals such as digital cameras, laser disks, camcorders, scanners, CD-ROMs, video-conferencing, and Internet access.

This year arrangements have been made with five Houston area museums and the Houston Zoo, to serve as destinations for field trips where teachers will research and collect material for their multimedia presentations. They will then return to the classroom, where they will use mPOWER to develop multimedia slideshow presentations about their chosen unit themes of oceanography and endangered species. One participant commented, "I am eating, breathing and dreaming multimedia!"

Another participant, John Schaff, a teacher at Northline Elementary, had his class use mPOWER to explain how they built many parts of their project for the NASA-sponsored "Mars Base" program. They then used mPOWER to share their Mars Base with students from Wales and Iowa during a two-hour videoconference with scientists from NASA. This was made possible by mPOWER's ability to do live video-conferencing from within the program, with the appropriate hardware configuration.

About The Learning Company

The Learning Company, a division of Mattel, Inc., develops and publishes some of the best-known consumer software for the entire family, including Reader Rabbit, ClueFinders, Arthur, Little Bear, Sesame Street, Dr. Seuss, Madeline, The Oregon Trail, Kid Pix, Carmen Sandiego, Learn to Speak and The Princeton Review. The Learning Company products are distributed and sold worldwide through multiple distribution channels such as retail stores, school sales, online, direct marketing and OEM. For further information, visit www.learningco.com or www.shopTLC.com.

About the School Division

Many of the most trusted educational software brands -- Broderbund, Compton's, Creative Wonders, MECC, Mindscape, and SkillsBank have been joined under the Learning Company umbrella. Now providing more than 160 titles for the school market, The Learning Company brands cover every grade level and every curriculum area, including: reading, language arts, writing, mathematics, science, social studies, reference, creativity and foreign languages. The Learning Company's school products range from subject and grade specific titles to cross-curricular tools, from basic skills remediation to high-level problem solving. The Learning Company's School Division products are sold through Authorized Education Resellers, and through direct sales to schools. The School Division Web site is located at www.learningcompanyschool.com.

NOTE: All trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

CONTACT: Mark L. Clark of The Learning Company School Division, 415-382-4950, or mark_clark@broder.com.